Christopher Nolan is most certainly a man who moves at his own pace. It's now been more than two years since the release of The Dark Knight, the superhero movie which changed the face of the genre and had even the grown-up critics spluttering into their popcorn in awe. And what does he gives us? One word. One measly little word.

Nolan revealed yesterday to the LA Times's Hero Complex blog that the long-awaited third and final film in his Batman trilogy will be titled The Dark Knight Rises. As predicted on this blog, it will be a direct follow-up to the previous film rather than a standalone adventure for the caped crusader. Once again Nolan is doing what is entirely sensible: working comfortably within the borders of his own, more realistic Batman universe, rather than pandering to studio demands for colourful villains or self-contained storylines.

There will be no Riddler (as widely predicted) in the new film, and I wouldn't be at all surprised if none of Batman's traditional enemies end up on the big screen. This is very much a new type of superhero saga – one which delivers the required thrills and spills, but also exists as a sort of souped-up character study of its hero. At the end of the last film, Bruce Wayne had more than enough on his plate, without yet another extravagantly costumed freak turning up to cause chaos on the streets of Gotham. If there is a new villain, expect them to be as in tune with Nolan's aesthetic as the Joker and Ra's al Ghul, who was so dialled down in Batman Begins that you didn't even realise he was the bad guy until about 20 minutes after the credits rolled.

Some bloggers today are still whispering "Catwoman", but it sounds as if Nolan is planning to start the action immediately from the point where The Dark Knight left off, with Batman on the run, a pariah with little public support. It's possible that the arrival of a new villain might be the catalyst for a public re-embracing of the vigilante, but introducing such a garish, bombastic villain at this point just doesn't seem to be Nolan's style.

The film-maker's confirmation that the Riddler will not make an appearance puts the final nail in the coffin of tabloid suggestions that Eddie Murphy would play the character in Batman 3. That's hardly a shock: anyone who took more than a few hours out of their lives to watch Nolan's films would have been swiftly made aware that stunt casting is not in his repertoire.

Neither, apparently, is 3D, despite the recent reports (now perhaps rather devalued) that Inception is to be retro-fitted in 3D for a cinematic and TV re-release (yes, 3D TVs are already here, catch up). The Dark Knight Rises will be shot once again on high definition Imax cameras, allowing Nolan the scope to depict Gotham's skylines with the same sweeping, panoramic bravado as he did in the previous film. 3D, according to the film-maker, makes for a more claustrophobic experience, and would have meant hiving the final film off from its two predecessors in terms of its overall style.

There had been strong suggestions that Warner Brothers suits were pushing hard for a Batman 3D, so well done to Nolan for sticking to his guns. What big guns they must be for him to do so in a time when pretty much every tentpole movie seems to be arriving in stereoscope. But then, when your second-to-last movie made more than $1bn around the globe, and your most recent effort drew spectacular audiences to a film with such an offbeat, brain-bamboozling premise that most people had to see it twice to get their heads round it (AND saw you hailed as the new Kubrick in the process), you probably get to have your own way now and again. Moreover, it seems, you get to take your own sweet time over things. On current evidence, that's just as it should be.